Good Samaritans: Helping the Coast Guard to help distressed mariners

Herald Gazette: Good Samaritans: Helping the Coast Guard to help distressed mariners
Rockport — Imagine being out on the water, for work or for pleasure, and suddenly, a call comes across the marine band radio.

“’Mayday, mayday, mayday. This is the passenger vessel Sea Swell. We are three miles east of Schoodic Head. We are on fire. Twelve people are abandoning…" And then the radio call ends.. What do you do now? Have you ever been faced with this situation?

That was one of the scenarios described by U.S. Coast Guard Passenger Vessel Safety Coordinator Rick Janelle, who spoke about fishing safety at the Maine Fishermen’s Forum, held at the Samoset Resort in Rockport March 3-5.

Janelle, who is stationed in Alaska, described the Coast Guard’s guidelines for “Good Samaritan” vessels assisting in maritime search and rescue.

“About three years ago, the Coast Guard achieved a milestone: We rescued our millionth person,” Janelle said. “We didn’t do that alone. We had a tremendous amount of help from fishermen and mariners, people just like yourself. But search and rescue is a never-ending mission. And to accomplish the next million, the two million mark, we’re going to need help. We‘re going to continue to rely on Good Samaritan fishing vessels, merchant vessels, anyone who is on the water.”

But the Coast Guard is making a push to improve the operational know-how of mariners who find themselves in a Good Samaritan situation, he said.

“The goal is to help you help us help those in need,” he said.

Maine is similar to Alaska, Janelle said, in that there is an increasing number of cruise ships, as well as a tremendous number of private yachts, passenger vessels that cruise the coast and fishing boats. Any one of them, he said, could become involved in an accident, and any one of them could be called upon to render assistance to another.

According to information provided by Janelle, the Coast Guard manages search and rescue operations according to a plan that divides the oceans into search and rescue regions. Each search and rescue region is the responsibility of a dedicated rescue coordination center, which in turn is subdivided into smaller areas managed by sector command centers.

According to the literature, the search and rescue mission coordinator is the person located at the rescue coordination center who is in charge of planning and directing a specific operation. For maritime incidents in the U.S., Coast Guard personnel serve as search and rescue mission coordinators.

The on-scene coordinator is the person designated by the mission coordinator to coordinate operations on scene and implement search and rescue plans developed by the search and rescue mission coordinator. Professional on-scene coordinators include the Coast Guard, state troopers and other government personnel who have received extensive training.

But in the case of marine accidents, private vessels are often the first on the scene, Janelle said.

“If you’re the first person on scene and will be first person for a while, you may find yourself in the functional role of the on-scene coordinator, which means you’re going to have to take some control to manage other resources that show up,” he said. “If you’re looking at thousands of people going into lifeboats, it’s a huge job.”

Traditional law of the sea says that mariners help mariners in distress, he said. It’s also a legal requirement, he said: Federal law requires a master to render assistance if the master can do so without serious danger to the master’s vessel or individuals on board.

The last point is important, he said, “We do not want you to become part of the problem. We don’t want to have to end up rescuing the rescuers. We want you to know your limitations.”

A Good Samaritan is a person or vessel that goes to the aid of another without compensation, he said. The standard of care is simply that one operates in a safe manner, he said.

“You exercise reasonable care to avoid conduct that worsens the conditions of the victims,” he said.

By way of example, Janelle said, “Let’s say you’re out there pulling your pots and you see something strange in the water. You realize it’s a kayaker who’s flipped over. The kayaker’s in the water and he’s to the point where he’s unable to do self-rescue. You pull up alongside and grab his lifejacket and you haul him up on deck. In the process of hauling him up, he either twists his leg or he cuts his arm or you do some kind of damage to the guy. Have you worsened his condition? No, because the alternative was, he was going to freeze to death. If you ran over the guy with your prop – then yes, you’ve worsened his condition.”

In one’s zeal, he said, it’s important to avoid reckless conduct. Another example he cited was coming in too fast alongside a lifeboat and crashing into the boat.

Government on-scene coordinators have received search and rescue training, he said. Good Samaritans, by contrast, must simply do what they think is right. But the Coast Guard seeks to offer some basic guidelines to make the job performed by Good Samaritans “a little more complete,” he said.

According to the information provided by Janelle, the duties of the first vessel to arrive on the scene include rescuing people from the water, establishing contact with the distressed master, establishing and maintaining contact with the Coast Guard, taking control of the coordination of other private vessels that arrive to help, and tracking the location of all evacuees from the distressed vessel.

The on-scene coordinator must not attempt a rescue that exceeds the limits of his capability, training or vessel, and that places his vessel, crew or passengers in danger. The on-scene coordinator must devise a plan of action before acting, and communicate the plan with his crew, to the Coast Guard and, if possible, to the distressed vessel.

“One thing I’ve noticed is that fishermen aren’t comfortable talking with the Coast Guard,” said Janelle. “So they don’t, or they communicate minimally. But in a search and rescue case, you have to communicate all the time.”

Janelle cited an incident in 2004 when communication could have been improved. The Alaskan state ferry Leconte ran hard aground on a reef with 86 people aboard. As it turned out, the first vessel to arrive was a government vessel – a research boat with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The weather was “pretty nice” – sunny and flat calm, he said. Many accidents, he said, happen on nice days. It would take several hours for the Coast Guard to show up, he said. In the meantime, some fishing vessels in the area learned of the grounding. Those with family members on the ferry showed up and decided to take their relatives off.

“So people got off, and neither the master nor the NOAA OSC thought it was important enough to write it down – who went, how many,” Janelle said. “An hour later, the ferry had arranged for a high-speed catamaran to come out for rest of passengers. When we did the math, we came up 11 short. We asked around, and they said, ‘Oh yeah, some people got off.’ ‘Where did they go? Who was it?’ ‘We don’t know.’ It took us several hours to run this down. We knew they were safe, but still, the mission isn’t finished until everyone is accounted for.”

Another guideline is a mariner who hears a mayday call, he said, should check in with the Coast Guard while also heading to the scene.

“Write down everything you remember and relay it to the Coast Guard while you are heading to the scene,” he said. “Then keep listening to the Coast Guard to get more information or any tasks they might have for you. And while you’re en route, start planning. How will I get people on board? What’s the weather? Do I have any limitations on my boat, with my crew? Am I fatigued? How long can I stay on scene and be effective? Do I have a harness for getting people on board? Do I have first aid available? Once you arrive on-scene, you don’t know what you’re going to find. Confirm the situation, make sure it’s what you heard, then take control of the situation. If you can raise the master of the vessel, do it. See if he’s got a situation on board that you’re not aware of. If you have a plan, activate it. Recover people in the water – those who don’t have life jackets first. Don’t lose track of anybody. Confirm with the master, what is the total number we’re starting with?”

Janelle said he has responded to numerous incidents where it’s difficult to keep track of people.

“I don’t know how many times in the Coast Guard we’ve counted 40 people on a boat, and counted again and it’s 41, and we count again and it’s 38,” he said. “They move around, they go in the head. Sometimes there are two of them under a blanket trying to stay warm. It’s a huge problem.”

Mariners should also do a risk assessment as they approach a distressed boat, he said.

“The hardest thing to do is to back off if you can’t help without putting yourself at serious risk,” he said. "Only you can make that decision. If you have to back off, I guarantee it’s going to be a hugely difficult decision to make.”

Mariners should make sure they’re communicating with their own crew, and make sure their crew is aware of their own survival gear and operating in a safe manner before helping the distressed vessel, he said.

Janelle showed slides of various incidents to which he has responded.

One involved a sunken vessel up against a steep cliff; about 25 enclosed life rafts were in the water around it. He said it was difficult to determine the extent of underwater obstructions around the boat, and the number of people in the rafts.

Another photo showed a fishing vessel that was capsizing – its deck tilted nearly vertically, some of the crew struggling for a grip and others going in the water. The incident took place off California in an area where the water was not only frigid but was inhabited by great white sharks, he said. In such a case, he said, a civilian on-scene coordinator would likely keep away from the sinking boat and might have to have people swim to him.

“Information to relay? Just get help here fast,” he said.